Investigation of the relationship between pharmacological knowledge of anticoagulants with medication adherence in the elderly patients with atrial fibrillation

In the elderly, the rate of adherence to the medication regimen and the rate of remembering how to correctly prescribe medication is low due to old age and memory loss, which leads to poor therapeutic results. The aim of this study was to determine the relationship between anticoagulants knowledge and adherence to treatment in elderly cardiac patients with atrial fibrillation.

This cross-sectional study was performed on 110 elderly patients aged 60 to 89 years with atrial fibrillation admitted to the Cardiac and Intensive Care Unit of Tohid Hospital in Sanandaj, Iran in 2020. The volunteers were included by available sampling method. Morisky Medication Adherence Scale-8 (MMAS-8) and Anticoagulation Knowledge Tool (AKT) was used to assess the level of anticoagulant knowledge. The reliability of the AKT was confirmed by retesting by 15 patients after one month; the correlation coefficient was 99.4. For determination the reliability of AKT, the questionnaire was provided to cardiologists and nurses. The validity and reliability of the MMAS-8 have been proven in previous studies.

The mean level of anticoagulant knowledge in elderly patients was 17.82±9.36 which is in the intermediate range. The mean score of adherences to treatment in this study was 6±1.54 which is in the intermediate range, too. There is a direct and significant relationship between anticoagulant knowledge and adherence to treatment (P=0.02).

The mean score of patients' knowledge about anticoagulants was moderate. Adherence to medication regimen and anticoagulants knowledge were higher in elderly with higher education than others. Applying training programs for the elderly in a simple and understandable way in this field can be helpful.